The Primal Hunter

They found themselves standing within a large open room more extensive than the one the Prime Summoner had been in. Jake estimated it had to be at least fifty kilometers long and about ten kilometers wide, and it was filled to the brim with life.

However, not the friendly kind if their names were anything to go by.

[Demon Guard – lvl 248]

[Demon Torturer – lvl 251]

That’s right, they were all demons. The entire floor was designed to have a bunch of spread camps and villages, with one large tower at the back of the room. There, from over forty-five kilometers away, Jake spotted a figure sitting and meditating on a chair atop the big tower overlooking the entire room.

[Demon Warden – lvl 255]

If one hadn’t noticed yet, then the names of all these demons had a theme of sorts. They were all guarding something. That something being large groups of people sealed within barriers in all of the camps and villages.

[Prisoner – lvl 175]

Jake also spotted a few C-grades, but they were mostly D-grades and even had a few E-grades mixed in. As he scouted the room, he also noticed that this entrance area was shrouded. Based on what Jake could see, nothing could detect them ten meters from the entryway, which was the only reason no one had spotted them yet. The reason for this magic circle was also pretty obvious.

”The second we make a move… those prisoners will be in deep shit,” Jake muttered to the group.

”They appear to be kept as potential sacrifices,” the Sword Saint muttered.

“Which means that when we are discovered, a good portion of them will be sacrificed relatively quickly,” the Fallen King said. “So we will have to decide whether we want to save as many as possible or rush this entire floor. If we split up and secure a camp each, we should be able to ensure to reach the 25% for the bonus objective. However, we will also need to be careful, any accidental attack could kill a significant portion of them, and while we may be careful, I doubt the demons care.”

“Ree,” Sylphie said with a low screech.

“Stealth is an option… but how many of us are good at it?” Jake asked. “I can do some stealth, but…”

He looked at the others beside him.

“Ree!” Sylphie said proudly.

“I think we already talked about giant tornadoes hiding you, not counting as being invisible,” Jake pointed out.

“Ree?”

“Yes, even if the tornado does so that none of them can see anything,” Jake said with a bit of exasperation.

“Ree…” Sylphie seemed a bit sad.

Jake felt a bit bad about ruining her plan, but someone had to say it. As they were trying to figure out what to do, Dina was kneeling on the ground and feeling the soil. That was Jake noticed that the ground was indeed different here. Rather than the hard rock of the chamber floor, it was more like normal soil found on the outside. Looking at Dina, he realized what she was trying to find out.

“Dina, what are you looking for?” the Sword Saint also asked curiously.

“There are a total of fourteen barriers with sealed prisoners within, right?” Dina asked.

Jake released another Pulse of Perception to scout the room and nodded. “Yeah, fourteen.”

Dina nodded along. “Give me ten minutes, and I will make sure they are safe.”

“You’re going to go through the ground, aren’t you?” Jake asked.

“Yeah, I will create protection for them by summoning vines,” she nodded as Jake saw her begin to infuse energy into the ground. Jake noticed the formation hiding their presence, beginning to slowly fade as she did this, and he responded by creating a barrier of stable arcane energy all around them that he colored the same as the background. Was this perfect stealth? No, but it appeared to be good enough, as Dina’s actions were not very flashy to begin with.

While Dina prepared, Jake and the three others also made plans for where to strike. Their main problem was the size of the room, so they needed someone to get to the back fast, preferably before the Warden had time to make a move. Jake ended up taking this upon himself as he opened a small hole in the stable arcane barrier and snuck out as he activated his stealth skill for the first time in a good while. With it, he also used something else he hadn’t really used before: his new cloak. It allowed him to be far more hidden while in the shadows, and as luck would have it, these demons weren’t a big fan of having a lot of light around and primarily used open fires everywhere, which cast plenty of shadows for Jake to stick to.